


Into The Fire

by inlovewithnight



Category: King Arthur
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-07
Updated: 2006-04-07
Packaged: 2017-10-15 13:19:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/161179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inlovewithnight/pseuds/inlovewithnight





	Into The Fire

She has power.

Lancelot has seen that from the moment they pulled her out of the cell beneath the earth. It was faint then, shuttered and battered, but the moment they reached the surface--when her feet touched living soil and she stood beneath the sky--it became so clear, he wonders that it didn't blind him.

Arthur can't see it, of course, not through his devotion to a single god, one who stands apart from the world. Lancelot knows, though. He may no longer believe, but he remembers. His mother's voice, and the holy men around the fires, telling of the gods in the world, earth and sun and sky and every living thing. How you could learn to reach through the veil between the worlds and touch them, let them into you, borrow their power and wield it as your own.

He'd never had a particular interest in learning the tricks of it--what use were gods when there were horses and swords to master?--but he can see it in her, the power of the land moving through her body and soul like light. This is her home, her own soil; the life in it recognizes the life in her as surely as it rejects his presence as alien, and has for fifteen long years. He hardly remembers the feeling of walking in a world that welcomed him as part of itself, a wanted child.

She draws strength from her land. And she _is_ strong: long, lean muscles lie under her skin and over her bones, and if Arthur truly looks at her and sees a broken maiden fair, then he has forgotten all of the times that the shadowy figures emerging from the trees and seeking the blood of his men had been proven, upon their deaths, to be female. The Woads armed their women and sent them to fight, as did the Sarmatians. Lancelot recognized the warrior in this girl from the start, as well as the mystic. He doesn't know if Arthur does the same, or if his eyes cast her as a gentle Roman lady. He can only hope that Arthur knows better, that he will see.

 _Open your eyes when you look at her, Arthur. See, think. She is more than she seems. The land is in her, blood and bone; she loves it as a second-self and cares for nothing so much as giving it life and freedom. Look closer, Arthur, my foolish friend. Look not as a servant of the Empire but with Briton eyes--and recognize your queen._

Not by birth-right, as the Romans gave such titles, but by right of power and the land's own choice, and how can any man who owed half of his blood to this soil fail to see that, even one so devoted to a foreign god? It's more than Lancelot can understand. But Arthur's willful blindness always is.

Guinevere is not so blind; she sees more than Lancelot might wish her to. She sees that the world has changed, that there is need now for politics as well as mystic power, and so she has determined to tie her destiny to Arthur's. Lancelot can only wish her luck, and the patience to endure the years of gentle manipulations it will take to get all that she wants out of her half-Roman would-be-consort. He has no doubt that she will, eventually, get her way. But he knows Arthur well enough to know that it will take time.

 _And may they have all the time in the world, here on their miserable island, and may I be far, far from its shores._ It's a hollow prayer, and not only for his lack of faith; he's never really expected to leave Britain alive. The dreams and the promise of a foolish child against the coldness of truth and grave-dirt. There's still time for him to die here.

He watches Guinevere walk and smile, sees the endless swirling thoughts and plans behind her eyes, and he finds himself hoping that she is not a fool. She cannot possibly think that she will be able to coax Arthur into being king the way she is queen, bound to the land in the old ways. She will never be able to convince him to go to the fields in the spring and renew the life in the earth. He may turn his back on Rome, he may swear to defend Britain until he dies, but at _witchcraft_ and _pagan ways_ the Arthur that Lancelot knows as a brother will draw the line. If Guinevere will be queen in that way--and she will; it is the only way she knows how--she will have to look elsewhere, take a second consort.

 _If you stay_ , says the flash in her eyes when Lancelot speaks to her, _might it not be you?_

He'd be a liar if he said he wasn't tempted, and while he _is_ a liar--any of his brothers-in-arms would fall over themselves to confirm it--he does not lie to himself. He desires Guinevere, as any man would, as she relies on. And he understands her, in a way that Arthur will not, not if they share a bed for twenty years. He thinks, when he sees that flash in her eyes and returns her edged smile, that she understands him as well, more than Arthur ever has, for all that they've shed blood together. Two of a kind, Lancelot and Guinevere, in some ways. They know each other as wolves do.

But he doesn't lie to himself, and he knows he cannot be what she hints at. He can't call life from a land that he hates, and that hates him in return. If he lies down with Britain's queen, the earth would turn to ashes. And while _that_ , too, is tempting, there's enough here that deserves its life. The horses that were foaled here. Tristan's hawk. Bors' children.

He admires her belief, in herself and in the future. He envies her connection here, the strength that comes from loving this place. The foolish and hopeful child that refuses to entirely die, no matter what Lancelot sees and does as a soldier, even dares to wonder if she might share those things with him, if he goes to her unguarded. If he humbles himself for a moment, touches the earth, lets himself remember for a moment to believe.

The voice of that child is very faint anymore, and easily denied.

Instead he watches Guinevere court Arthur in her artless way, as calculated as any battle-plan, and he smiles every so slightly, knowing that both of their fates are set in stone as solid as the fortress. They will give their lives to this island, and Britain will endure. _And I'll be ashes on a strong east wind._

He laughs a little at the thought, sharp and humorless, and raises his hand in mocking salute to them both. Let them have their faith, their hope, their cool and practical sort of love. Those aren't things that can be shared, however much one might want them. They are a fire that burns bright but gives no heat, only light without substance. Lancelot is a man of substance, of iron and blood and fifteen years' service, and it is not his place to want such things.  



End file.
